35053668-Empire-of-the-Soul-Paul-William-Roberts

EMPIRE OF THE SOUL
yoghurt – but with a powerful, gritty, and somewhat bitter herbal
flavour. It tasted the way you’d expect a handful of pot, a dash of
sand, and a pint of watery curds to taste after a minute in the blender.
All the same, thirst, along with the humid, airless room, made me
down mine in seconds. If a South Indian woman could handle a
glass, I thought, then how strong could the stuff be?
‘You like more?’ asked Amar.
I wondered what kind of night that shy South Indian girl was in
for. I think she was wondering, too – and I think she knew that,
whatever it was going to be like, she wouldn’t enjoy it. She wasn’t
expected to enjoy it.
‘No. Let’s go.’
He shrugged and drained his glass. Well-fuelled junkies tend to
be pliant. The bill was nearly fifty cents – steep by Indian standards.
Twenty cents was probably an illegal activity surcharge, and another
twenty most likely Amar’s finder’s fee. Western custom was prized,
worth twenty times local business, and those bringing it were always
rewarded. Everyone in Benares seemed to double as commissioned
sales agents for countless enterprises.
Fully expecting to be discussing metaphysics soon with cactus
deities and mushroom gods, I followed the loping inferno-fortune
heir back into the swarming Indian night. By kerosene tapers, paan
wallahs, squatting chin to knee on stall counters like huge birds,
sprinkled their arcane concoctions of betel nut, lime paste, herbs,
and spices into damp green leaves, then folding and pinning them
together with cloves to form them into triangles. These bulging
wads were meant to dissolve slowly, tucked between teeth and cheek
and functioned as part digestive, part mouthwash. One could last
over two hours. Some rare paans, rumoured to contain powdered
rhino horn, crushed gemstones, dried goat testicles and such,
allegedly possessed aphrodisiac and narcotic properties and could
cost many thousands of rupees.
Next to the paan stalls, pakora wallahs ladled deep-fried lentilpaste
balls from bubbling vats of blackened oil; farther along, curds
were poured into sweating earthenware pots; beyond that, milk
sweets wrapped in edible silver foil were set out carefully, like
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